


Billy Hargrove & the Two Weeks From Hell

by lilies_in_a_vase



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Billy Hargrove Needs a Hug, Child Neglect, Crying Billy Hargrove, Food Issues, Gen, Good Parent Joyce Byers, Headaches & Migraines, How Do I Tag, Hurt Billy Hargrove, Hurt/Comfort, I don’t know what to tag, I don’t really edit fanfic, If We Die Like Men Without One Does That Mean We Live Like Queens With One, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Nausea, POV Billy Hargrove, POV Joyce Byers, Passing Out, Protective Joyce Byers, Sick Billy Hargrove, Vomiting, hunger, i wouldn’t know, no beta we die like men
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-19
Updated: 2020-10-19
Packaged: 2021-03-09 04:27:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,809
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27108718
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lilies_in_a_vase/pseuds/lilies_in_a_vase
Summary: Billy is looking forward to two weeks alone without Neil, Susan, or Max, but whatever plans he’d made fall and crash and catch fire and burn and whatever else when he realises they forgot to leave him food.Enter Joyce Byers, the woman who is, without contest, Hawkins’ Best Mother.
Relationships: Barely there Billy Hargrove/Steve Harrington, Joyce Byers & Billy Hargrove
Comments: 16
Kudos: 194





	Billy Hargrove & the Two Weeks From Hell

**Author's Note:**

> TRIGGER WARNING  
> This work deal with a teenager being left alone at home without any means of buying food, and having to ration the little food he has at home, until the food runs out and he tries stealing. He also gets a migraine. 
> 
> The title’s shit, but I wanted to post more than I wanted to take an hour to figure out an actually good title. Part of me wanted to name this “Billy Hargrove & The Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Two Weeks From Hell” but I don’t actually know enough about that book to feel confident in referencing it. And I was too lazy to google. 
> 
> Also, please, anyone, if you notice me writing “Couch” instead of “Coach”, and I am begging you, please tell me. I... I made that mistake too often writing this. The first time it happened I had to take a couple seconds just to stare into space and contemplate my existence. 
> 
> Disclaimer:  
> I don’t own “Stranger Things”.

_ Saturday 9th of February 1985 _

  
  


Billy wakes up alone. 

Not, like, alone as in  _ whoever he had sex with left _ , but alone as in  _ he has the whole house to himself _ _._ And he’s going to have it like that, for two whole weeks. 

He almost entertains the idea of throwing a party, and he might’ve, had he still been in California. But this is Hawkins, and Hawkins is a small town, so there’s no doubt it would somehow get back to Neil.

Susan got a call, yesterday, while Billy and Max were at school. Apparently her dad was up on the roof of her parents’ garage doing  _ something _ and while climbing down the ladder he slipped and fell off and broke his goddamn leg. Why the fuck an old guy thought it intelligent to climb around on roofs Billy will never understand. But, it did mean that Billy gets the house to himself. When he’d gotten home with Maxine yesterday they’d come home to two pizzas and Susan in a frenzy. Neil, Susan and Max were supposed to leave Billy alone for one whole week anyway, but that was because of Susan’s mum’s birthday party, and they weren’t supposed to leave until next week. But then her dad went and broke his leg and Susan called Max’ school to explain the situation and told them Max had to miss two weeks instead of one. There was never any talk of Billy going with them. He’s never met Susan’s parents, and he honestly doesn’t think he wants to, either. 

So now he has the house alone to himself for two whole weeks. He’s not going to have to give a fuck what Neil says for two whole weeks. He’ll get to go on how many dates and to how many parties he wants. 

Maybe he ought to thank Susan’s old man for giving him an extra week of freedom.

Billy takes the chance to just lie in bed for a while without having to worry about someone bursting in and telling him to do something. It’s really fucking nice. 

It’s Saturday, and Billy’s alone without any plans for the day, so he doesn’t bother doing anything to his hair. He goes to the bathroom, and then he goes to the kitchen. 

They just had it remodelled, the last part being finished this week, so they’d had to eat everything they’d put in the freezer and fridge and cupboards before the work had begun, and during it they’ve mostly been eating takeout or whatever Susan could prepare based on whichever part of the kitchen she had access to. She was supposed to go out and buy groceries yesterday after work since they’d finally been able to use the whole kitchen, and so what meets him in the kitchen does leave him shocked. 

There is... nothing there. No food. Or, well, there is cheese, and butter, and orange juice in the fridge. Two tubs of ice cream in the new freezer that Billy knows Susan bought for Max so she could take it with her for a sleepover with that weird girl she hangs out with. There are four apples left in the fruit bowl on the kitchen table, and Billy finds one bag of crackers and enough pasta for three portions in the only cupboard that isn’t empty. 

Billy does an inventory, stacks it all up on the counter, everything his family thought he should have to eat for two weeks, and with quickly dwindling hope and surfacing anger decides to go check if any of them thought to leave him money. 

They didn’t. He goes through the whole house and there’s nothing. And there’s no use hoping someone will have lost some spare change somewhere. Max puts her money directly into her wallet, and Susan never takes her wallet out of her purse while at home, and Neil always keeps his wallet close. He is not one to lose some spare change or leave money lying around in the house. Usually both Billy and Max are given some pocket money every week, but Neil decided to stop it until the kitchen was finished to make sure he had enough money to pay for it. So Billy doesn’t have anything left over, because he’s used up everything. And, well, he wasn’t assuming this would happen. 

It’s not like it’s the first time this has happened, though. It’s not the first time Neil has forgotten that Billy needs to eat and that he’s had to go hungry. But it’s never been for this long, and it hasn’t happened since before Susan and Max moved in. Billy doubts that Susan meant to forget about him, though. She’s not like Neil. She’s a coward, and she’s annoying and a bit of a bitch, but she’s not... she’s not like Neil. 

He goes back to the kitchen and gets himself a glass of orange juice for breakfast. The day is spent alternating between blasting music from his room while he weightlifts, and watching TV. He cooks himself some pasta for dinner. 

_ Sunday 10th of February 1985 _

Sunday is just a repetition of Saturday. Orange juice, music, weightlifting, TV, music, weightlifting, TV, music, weightlifting, shower, pasta, TV...

_ Monday 11th of February 1985 _

He wakes up on Monday and drinks his glass of orange juice, takes a shower and brushes his teeth, pulls on clothes and gets his hair done, and off he goes to school. 

_ Tuesday 12th of February 1985  _

He eats the crackers for breakfast. 

Billy did go to the cafeteria at school on Monday, but then today his stomach the second he could smell the food so he turned on his heel and went to the library. It’s quiet there, and lately everyone’s become fucking irritating.

On a normal day, Billy can deal with Tommy. But right now, he can’t deal with the stupid bullshit that comes out of his goddamn mouth, so the library is a welcome sanctuary from the idiocy that fills Hawkins High’s halls. 

It’s almost empty at lunch time, just Billy and the librarian and the few spread out nerds who don’t have anything better to do. 

Billy finds himself a secluded spot where no one can see him, and grabs a book from a random shelf to read. 

_ Wednesday 13th of February 1985 _

He’s so fucking tired. 

Billy’s tired, he’s really tired, be he can’t fucking manage to sleep at night. He doesn’t think he fell asleep until 2 am, and then he kept waking up. He gave up on sleep at 5 am, and had his glass of orange juice for breakfast. He’d stood in front of the open fridge and stared forlornly at the cheese in the cold light of the fridge’s lamp, and wished it was later, that he’d come back from school, and could just grab it and eat it. But he can’t. It’s his dinner for the day. 

Of course, once he actually gets to school, he has to fight not to fall asleep in class. At times, he feels his vision go blurry, or he spaces out and loses time. He gets asked a question and only manages to answer it because he’s been reading ahead as a way to distract himself from the fact that he has no real dinner to eat. 

_ Thursday 14th of February 1985  _

He knows he’s not supposed to eat it, but it’s there, and he’s just so fucking hungry, and he’s so tired, and he needs to finish this stupid fucking essay, but he has no goddamn energy, and Billy knows it’s Max’s favourite but it’s his as well, and it’s sweet and he knows it’ll give him the sugar high he needs, and it feels like it’s taunting him from where he knows it’s lying in the middle drawer of the freezer, and- 

Billy caves in and eats the ice cream. The whole tub. And it’s just  _ so good _ _,_ it tastes just like he thought it would, if not even better. Like sleeping on clouds and running through a rainbow. 

He crashes almost as soon as his essays finished. And with it comes the guilt, and the panic, the goddamn  _ fear _ , and Billy ends up on the living room floor, his back against the couch and sobbing his eyes out. 

He tries to console himself with the fact that there were two tubs, and he promises himself he’s not going to eat the other one, and Susan will probably feel guilty they forgot to leave him money or food, so she might stop his dad from hurting him too much when Max complains that Billy ate her shit. Maybe.

It’s not enough to stop him from crying, but at least it doesn’t get worse. Sometimes, more when he was younger than now, Billy’s cried until he couldn’t breathe. Then Neil got angry because he was loud and acting like a little girl, and Billy learned to cry quietly. 

But there’s no one here now. And so Billy cries, and cries, and cries until he falls asleep. 

_ Friday 15th of February 1985  _

He wakes curled up on the floor, wedged between the couch and coffee table, and his stomach rumbles. He’s hungry every time he wakes up. On a normal day, a day where he’d eat breakfast with Max and then drive them both to school, he’d be late. But as it now is, it doesn’t take long for Billy to drink his glass of orange juice and get in the Camaro and drive to school.

He wears his jacket in class, and talks back to the teachers who try to get him to take it off; it’s fucking freezing. It’s like they’ve turned off whatever heating the school had, and Billy’s shivering even with his jacket on. So  _ no, Mr. Lloyd, he will not take it off.  _

The one thing that got Billy through the week was the thought of getting to finally eat something once he got home. Today, he gets an apple. 

He feels restless. But thankfully, some Senior is throwing a party, so Billy goes there. He’s still hungry, so maybe he’ll be able to fill his stomach on alcohol if nothing else.

That plan doesn’t really work out, though, because Billy’s just reached the point where he thinks he can call himself drunk, and that shit happened way quicker than it usually takes, when the pounding of the bass starts to pound in time with his head, so Billy flees outside where he promptly bends over and vomits into a little bush. 

“You okay, man?” 

Billy straightens and turns around at Harrington’s voice. Harrington, who stands there peering at Billy with a concerned frown, something Billy guesses wouldn’t have happened if he hadn’t apologised to him before winter break. Who’s dressed nicely, like the rich dude he is, and who Billy saw inside earlier, just... standing there. Looking fucking hot. 

And Billy’s running on too little food and too little sleep and maybe he’s actually  _ really _ drunk, and Harrington’s looking fucking  _ perfect _ , and Billy’s been dreaming of dragging his hands through that perfect hair for weeks. 

So he does just that. 

He stumbles forward, and he’s aiming for kissing Steve, which he expects he’ll get a punch in the face over, but he misses and falls into his chest with a giggle Billy has a hard time imagining actually came from his own mouth. On the other hand, at that moment, it feels more important to get to touch Harrington’s hair than his lips.

“Pretty... pretty hair, Harr... Harrington. Can I touch?”

“What? No!” 

Billy imagines he’s about to be dropped to the ground then, but Harrington keeps a hold on his arms. Which is good, because Billy’s legs feel like jelly. He shivers. 

“Please? ...please? Looks... looks soft...” 

“Okay, fuck Hargrove. You’re fucking wasted.” Harrington changes the grip he’s got on Billy’s arms and tries to pull him up, so he’s taking more of his own weight. “Did you lose weight?” 

Billy laughs, and in his head it sounds loud enough that he imagines someone should come out and check on what the fuck is going on outside that’s so funny, but no one comes, or perhaps they do, because Billy doesn’t remember much after that. 

He wakes up on the couch in his own living room, no one else in sight. 

_ Saturday 16th of February 1985 _

He’s got a hangover from hell. 

The upside is that it distracts him well enough from the hunger he knows he’s supposed to feel. 

It’s around noon that he starts feeling like a real human being again, and stumbles into the kitchen for his daily glass of orange juice, followed by another one of the apples.

He woke up cold, and his hands are so cold he spends minutes running them under hot water, but it proves futile because soon they’re as cold as they were before. He’s been cold this entire fucking week. 

He starts digging through his closet for anything remotely warmer than what he usually wears. It’s hard, because Billy chooses his clothes based on what he’ll look hot in, and most of them are from California. 

He ends up taking a hot shower, water nearly scalding, which is nice while he‘s in it, but as soon as he steps out he’s met with  _ cold cold cold _ air. He wraps himself in a towel, dries off as quickly as possible and pulls on one of the only pair of long sweatpants he owns, before dragging his duvet out to the couch with him. He plants himself in front of the tv, shivering, and the plan to stay there the rest of the day. 

His plan was to eat only the one apple that day. After all, Billy reasons, he needs less food, because food is energy, and he’s not doing anything that day, because he’s trying to save energy, because he’s trying to save food, and on the cycle goes. It takes Billy a while to get out of his own head.

But he’s hungry, he’s so fucking hungry, his mouth is salivating just by the thought of food, and it’s like he’s on autopilot when he stumbles away from the couch and into the kitchen and eats another apple. He barely manages to stop himself from eating the last one. 

On his way to his bed to go to sleep that evening, he stops by Maxine’s room and takes her duvet with him. He falls asleep with that one on top of his own. 

_ Sunday 17th of February 1985 _

The orange juice lasted him a whole week. It’s gone by Sunday, and Billy almost cries, because he has nothing to eat for Monday. 

He has a test tomorrow, so he spends the day trying to study, but he can’t concentrate. He eats the last apple in the hope that it’ll make him focus, but all it does is remind Billy that he’s hungry. That’s a thing his body does. If he doesn’t eat, he’ll feel hungry, but eventually, after an hour or two, that feeling will start to ebb away and he’ll just feel numb. Until he does actually eat something. And then he’ll feel hungry again. 

Billy sprawls out on the couch and for a second it feels like he can feel his heart beating in the side of his belly. 

_ Monday 18th of February 1985 _

Billy’s impressed he manages to write anything at all during the test. 

He goes to stand up as soon as the bell rings, but he must have stood up too quickly because he’s hit by a wave of dizziness that doesn’t dissipate until he’s almost the only one left in the classroom.

But then on the other hand, as he realises as soon as he gets out of the classroom, he can’t actually remember anything of what he wrote, so maybe he just wrote cuss words and scrambled in the margins and turned in an essay on How Much He Hates Neil. 

Billy can feel himself start to tremble at that thought, at what Neil will do if he gets a bad grade or, even worse, if a teacher actually calls home to ask why Billy wrote five hundred words on how much he hates his own dad. It starts with his hands shaking, and the feeling that there’s something (panic, fear, dread) stuck in his throat and making it hard to breathe, and because it’s lunch break Billy turns towards the library. He feels like running, but he doesn’t think his legs will be able to carry him if he starts. 

Thankfully, it’s not far, and a quick glance around tells him it actually looks empty, but Billy still hurries over to his corner of the library, where he promptly falls down to rest with his back against a bookcase. He pulls his knees up and rests his head between them, taking deep breathes to quell the oncoming panic. 

“Hey, hon,” a voice says from above him, he isn’t sure how much later, when Billy’s calmed down but still hasn’t moved from his spot on the floor. Billy looks up sharply to see the librarian standing in front of him, looking a little concerned. She’s got two mugs in her hands. “You alright down there?” 

Billy swallows, feels his cheeks starting to heat up. “Yeah. I’m fine.” 

She spends a couple seconds just looking at him, trying to figure out if she’s going to believe him or not, he guesses. But Billy assumes he seems embarrassed more than anything else, because she sighs and nods. “Alright then. I’m just going to leave this here,” she says, and places one of the mugs on the floor beside him. “It’s hot cocoa. Always helps me when I’m feeling stressed.” And with that she turns around and leaves him alone. 

Billy waits until he’s certain she’s gone before he snatches it up so quickly it almost spills. 

It’s the best cocoa he’s ever tasted. And Billy’a pretty sure that isn’t just his empty belly talking. Maybe she put cocaine in it.

It’s sweet, and smooth, and chocolaty, and the perfect temperature. It warms him up from the inside. Billy’s been cold for so many days now, he though he’d start to forget what it feels like to be warm.

He wonders if she’s seen him come here during his lunch breaks this past week, and if she does this to every ‘stressed’ student she sees. For a second, Billy realises he might be in the process of becoming one of the library’s regulars, and if that means he’s going to get roped into joining her little Secret Nerd Club where they sit and study and read and discuss their feelings, filled with the rest of the libraries regulars; the kids hiding from bullies, and the actual nerds, and the smart ones with good grades who aren’t hot or aggressive or arrogant enough to be popular like Billy. He imagines he’d stick out like a sour thumb. 

But then again, if it means he’ll get more of this incredible cocoa, then maybe he’ll just decide to join. 

The cocoa helped him get through the rest of the day, but he’s really fucking tired once he gets home. He falls asleep with a stomach cramping up from its desperate want for food. 

_ Tuesday 19th of February 1985 _

Billy drinks water all day on Tuesday. He drinks it before going to school, and he drinks it during every break between classes, because he figures it’ll fill up his stomach and stop it from  _ hurting _ so damn much. 

Billy’s also deathly afraid that it’ll rumble during class. He doesn’t think he’d survive the embarrassment.

So he drinks water, and while he’s there, he takes the time to splash some on his face in the hope that it’ll make him wake up, because he keeps yawning all the damn time. Which, of course, leads to some f his teachers glaring at him disapprovingly, but Billy can’t muster up the energy to give a crap. 

He’s on his way to his car at the end of the day to drive home, when he gets stopped by Max’s curly haired friend... Dustin, or whatever his name is. He shouts at him when he kid asks him when Max will be back, and the kid tries glaring back and says something self righteous that Billy doesn’t bother sticking around to listen to. 

Fuck, Billy also wants Max to be back. If only because it means that there will be food to eat.

He drinks some more water when he gets home. 

_ Wednesday 20th of February 1985 _

Billy wakes with an ache in his temples. It stays steady throughout the day, and he figures it’s because he’s slept like shit for a week. 

Lunch break arrives, and Billy wanders into the library as he’s done more or less every day since this whole mess began. He almost wishes he could go to the librarian and ask her for more cocoa, because all he can think about is its sweet taste. But that would make her actually interested in looking into why Billy’s so desperate for any form is food or drink that isn’t water.

He has basketball practice that afternoon, and if Billy was freezing before it’s no match against what he feels after having changed. He plays shirts, because there’s not a chance in hell that he’ll take off any more clothes. 

And Billy’s running, running, running, and then he’s stopping, lightheaded,  _ weak _ . He feels off kilter, like he’s about to throw up, and he hopes he isn’t swaying as much as it feels like he is. 

Then there’s a ball coming towards him, and the only reason Billy manages to catch it is because of years developing reflexes playing the sport. But the force of it throws him off balance, and it makes his head swim so he closes his eyes against the churning nausea. He takes a couple stumbling steps backwards straight into something soft, hears someone shout “Hargrove!”, and the next thing Billy knows he’s lying on the floor, Harrington’s concerned face upside down above his, Coach by his side, and somebody’s bag underneath his legs.

“The fuck happened?” Billy blinks against the harsh lights high up on the ceiling, and wishes Harrington would move his head just a little and cover them. They make his head throb. 

“You fainted,” Harrington says, and they’re something in his tone. Something Billy can’t figure out. He says it like a statement, but there’s a question in his eyes. 

“Harrington caught you,” Coach says. “Stay down, Hargrove.” 

Billy’s not planning on moving. Not until he stops feeling like he’ll vomit the second he gets anywhere close to vertical, at least. 

“You think you need the nurse? Harrington stopped you from hitting your head, at least, but...” 

“No,” Billy says. He’s mastered the art of avoiding the school nurse. Besides, it’s not like she’s likely to give him any information he doesn’t already have. There’s no point. 

“Okay then,” Coach says, and for a second it looks like Harrington is about to protest, but he shuts his mouth as soon as he opened it. Perhaps he realises he isn’t Billy’s friend, and thus has no reason to be worried about him. Even though he’s probably the reason Billy got home safe last Friday. After Billy tried to kiss him. And asked to pet his hair. God, he feels  _ mortified _ . “Give me your arm, Hargrove.” 

Billy does, and Coach grabs it and helps him up to sitting. Billy can feel Harrington’s hands against his back, pushing him up.

“We’ll just get you over here to the side,” Coach says, and Harrington’s hands disappear as Billy gets his legs under him, trying to avoid stepping on the bag. Coach helps him the few steps to the side, and lowers him to the ground again. Billy’s grateful when Coach crouches down in front of him, because it obscures his view of the rest of the room, and Billy could feel the other players staring at him. “Put your head between your knees, okay? It’ll help. Once you feel well enough, you’re free to go home.” 

Billy swallows, nods, and Coach clasps a hand on his shoulder. He smiles and gives it a squeeze, before turning around and blowing his whistle to get the game started again. Billy winches at the sound. 

But he curls up so his head ends up between his raised knees, and he tries to just breathe and ignore everything else for a second. Ignore the ache in his head, and the cramping of his empty stomach and just breathe. 

Billy wants to get out of there as soon as possible. He can feel Harrington throwing glances at him. But he needs to wait until he’s sure he won’t just plop back down if he tries walking.

Eventually though, eventually, he reaches the point where he feels steady enough on his legs to stand up, and walk out to the locker room. He doesn’t shower, doesn’t want to risk slipping on the wet floor. The last thing he needs is for the others to come in and find his passed out naked body. No, thank you. 

And he’s barely sweaty. So he changes into his ordinary clothes, and grabs his bag, and leaves. 

**_ Joyce _ **

Joyce has dealt with shoplifters before. 

Once, a couple of years ago, it was someone she could clearly tell was on drugs and who she also didn’t recognise from around town.

But usually, it’s kids who try to sneak a little candy, or who just grab anything at all because their friends dared them to, and they don’t want to be chicken, or girls who take some lipstick hoping Joyce won’t notice. She’s even had some drunk teens late in the evening, but they’d always laughed good naturally and left when Joyce stopped them. One afternoon, there’d been a girl who’d just gotten her period for the first time but didn’t have any money with her. Joyce had helped her to the right brand and had let her use the employee toilet to put in her pads after Joyce told her how. She’d paid for those pads that day, telling the girl not to worry about it. 

She recognises Max’ stepbrother the moment he steps in. She remembers coming home that fateful night in autumn to find him picking himself up from her floor, a broken plate not too far away from him. 

Will told her Max was supposed to be gone for ‘like, two weeks’ with both her mum and stepdad, so Joyce had kind of assumed that Billy would be gone as well. But he’s not, he’s stepping into Melvald’s with his hands deep in the pockets of his jean jacket, and he doesn’t look at her when he steps in. It’s a slow afternoon, and the two of them are the only ones there. 

He spends a while looking around the shop, before he starts walking towards the exit, past the register. 

Joyce can immediately tell that he’s taken something and is not planning on paying for it. He’s got that same wary, cautious, almost guilty, look that Joyce has learned to recognise on people not used to theft about to steal something. 

And she can see his jacket bulging out in ways that are not normal no matter how hard he tries to hide it.

Joyce meets his gaze and holds it until he’s almost right in front of the register. She has a couple different ways of playing this, but decides that complete ignorance that he was planning on stealing might be the best course of action. 

“Right, so, do you want me to put that in a bag for you while you get your wallet out?” 

Billy freezes, and slowly turns to look at her. He’d had his gaze set on the door, before. “What?” 

Joyce raises her eyebrows at him. “This is a store, as I’m certain you very well know. Which means you have to pay for the things you plan to take home.” 

He stares right back at her, trying to act nonchalant, but Joyce can see the way his finger fidget against the hem of his jacket. “Pay for... pay for what?” 

She sighs, and decides to drop the charade. She’d given him an out, he hadn’t taken it. “I can see you’re hiding something beneath that jacket of yours.” 

“I’m not hiding anything.” 

“You certain of that?” she says in the same voice she’s used on Jonathan or Will on those few occasions when they’ve tried lying to her. 

For a second she sees Billy set his jaw, sees his eyes flicker towards the door, calculating how far and how long it’ll take him to exit, then she sees him bite his lip and turn to look at her from underneath his eyelashes. 

Joyce gets the strangest, horrified feeling that he’s looking her up and down, evaluating if he can flirt his way past her. She frowns, and knows she’s looking worried. 

Billy sighs, and goes up to the counter, and takes out what he’d been about to steal. 

Joyce is not expecting what she sees him put on the counter in front of her. 

There’s a small package of pre-sliced cheese, and the cheapest bread they have, squished from the way he’d been holding it. Billy’s not looking at her. He’s staring at the bread with longing in his eyes. Joyce sees him swallow. 

There is something horribly heartbreaking about stealing food. Joyce hasn’t had to deal with that one yet. She feels almost guilty for stopping him. But she hadn’t expected... well, _this._

She turns and gets out a plastic bag, putting the food in it and handing it over to him. Billy’s staring at her, confusion in his eyes, and Joyce smiles kindly. “Take it”, she says. 

He doesn’t speak, but his eyes look grateful, and he takes the bag and walks quickly out the door. Joyce watches him go with a worried frown on her face.

At the end of her shift, when Donald has come in to take over, Joyce goes through the store and grabs the basics of groceries and then some. 

Donald raises an eyebrow at her when she comes back to pay. “The kids eat everything you had at home?” 

Joyce smiles tightly. “You could say that.” 

She knows where the Hargrove-Mayfields’ live, even though she’s never been there before, because she keeps the addresses and phone numbers of all Will’s friends with her at all times. Most numbers she knows by heart, but Max is still relatively new to the group, so Joyce hasn’t managed to memorise it yet. 

Billy wrenches the door open only to come to a halt when he sees her. For a second, it looks like he’s about to close the door in her face but he falters when his eyes fall on the full plastic bags hanging from each of her arms. He leans against the doorframe instead, arms crossed. Hugging himself. He’s changed into sweatpants and a tank top since Joyce last saw him. His hair looks a little wet. 

“I brought groceries!” Joyce says with a smile, mentally begging him not to question her or acknowledge how strange it is for her to be there. There seems to be a battle happening in his head, because he doesn’t say anything but Joyce sees his eyes flicker between her face and the bags. Hunger, and desperation, seems to win out in the end, because he sighs and moves so she can get in past him. 

Joyce leaves him to lock the door behind her, and wanders further into the house. There’s the living room first, and then there’s the kitchen. She places her bags on the table, and starts to unpack. 

There is... there is nothing in their pantries, or in the fridge. 

There’s one tub of ice cream in the freezer. 

Billy comes in when Joyce is halfway finished unpacking and fully finished poking around. He pulls up a chair and more or less falls into it. 

“When was the last time you ate anything?” Joyce asks, trying to go for absentminded, in hopes that it’ll make him answer quicker. She doesn’t want him to feel like she’s interrogating him. 

“I had an apple on Sunday. And the librarian gave me a cup of cocoa during lunch break on Monday.” 

But that makes her pause. She turns around to stare at him, incredulous. He’s got one arm up on the table, leaning on it. “You had an  _ apple _ on  _ Sunday? _ ” 

Billy sighs. “We just remodelled the kitchen. And Susan was distracted because they called her saying her dad got hurt. They forgot to leave me money.” 

Like that’s an excuse.

Billy shoots up from his seat then, from nowhere, and stands swaying for a couple of seconds before he starts to tilt, looking about to keel over, and Joyce grabs his arm with both her hands and guides him down to the chair again. She imagines he stood up too quickly, and got dizzy. That happens when you don’t eat anything for two days. Although she hopes he’s eaten some of the bread and cheese he tried to steal. 

“You’re going to stay there. Sit still.”

But Billy shakes his head, groans, and reaches his hands up to hold the sides of his head, burying his hands in his hair. “No, no, no, no, no...  _ shit! _ Stupid, so fucking stupid!”

“Billy? Billy, hey!” 

He shoots up again, catching himself it’s a hand on the back of a chair, rushes, stumbling, out through the door. Joyce follows after him, all the way to the door to the bathroom which Billy throws open, only to crash to the floor in front of the toilet and promptly start to vomit into the bowl.

Or he tries to, at least. But other than the bread and cheese, his stomachs empty, so it ends up being stomach acid and painful heaves that wrack his frame. Joyce doesn’t waste any time sitting down behind him, reaching out to hold his hair out of the way and stroke his back. It doesn’t take long before he leans back against her, and Joyce can hear him softly sobbing. He’s trembling all over. 

“Fuck, fuck, so stupid,  _ fuck _ ...”

“Billy? Do you know what’s wrong?” 

“I get migraines. Migraines with an aura.” He laughs brokenly, and then winches and whines when it must hurt his head. “Somehow I both can’t see  and everything’s too bright at the same time. I should have recognised the symptoms.”

_ Maybe, _ Joyce thinks,  _ but then again, you were dealing with the symptoms of not having eaten for two days.  _

“Where’s your medication?” 

“Don’t bother, I needed to have taken it earlier. It doesn’t help once the pain’s already set in.” God, Joyce’s heart aches for him. 

“Okay. You think you feel up to moving to your bed?” 

There’s silence for so long Joyce wonders if he didn’t hear her. But then: 

“I can’t get there by myself.” It’s am admission of weakness, and a request for help, and it sounds like it takes everything for him to say it.

“I’ll help you, then,” Joyce says, and manoeuvres them so Billy gets an arm around her shoulders. He’s about seven inches taller than her, and still shaking, so it isn’t easy getting him out of the bathroom and in through the door he points out as his own. And she guesses he wasn’t kidding when he couldn’t really see, because he keeps stumbling. If Joyce wasn’t there to guide him in the right direction, she’s afraid he’d have walked into a wall several times by now. 

He drops to his bed with a moan, and Joyce pulls the duvet over his trembling form. He’s got two of them, she notices, but one is decidedly more girly than anything she expects Billy to own. It’s Max’, she realises. She pulls it over him, as well. 

Then she sets out to close the blinds so the room ends up bathed in darkness, and closes the door gently behind herself. 

Next, she decides it’s time to make herself useful. She sets a kettle to boil, to make the tea that always helps her against nausea. While waiting for the water to boil, she grabs the phone to call his school to let them know he’s sick and not coming in tomorrow. 

Which turns out being harder than it needs to be. 

_ “I’m sorry, Ms. Byers, but you’re not his parent, so we can’t accept-“  _

“He’s sick!” Joyce says, exasperated. “His parents are away. There’s just me here, no other adults.”

_“That may be so, but we still need a parent,”_ the woman on the other end says. _“We can’t accept anyone else. Besides, unless a parent calls in, how are we to know that he isn’t faking it?”_

“So had I called in and introduced myself as Susan Hargrove, you’d have accepted that? You can’t know all parents by voice!”If it isn’t the stress about the Upside Down that will give her grey hairs, it is certainly this. 

_ “True. But I know  _ you _by voice, Joyce.”_

Joyce sighs and closes her eyes. “Deborah,  _ please _ _._ I have no way of contacting his parents.” 

She hears Debbie sigh on the other end as well. _“What has he even got, Joyce? And what are you doing there?”_

“He came by Melvald’s. He’s got a migraine.” Debbie doesn’t need to know Billy tried to steal food. And she isn’t certain if telling her about the migraine will help his case or not. Joyce had a boss when she was a teenager who told her coworker that if it was just a headache she could take a pill and come in to work anyway. He fired that girl when she didn’t show up. 

But this time it seems to work in their favour, because Joyce hears Debbie gasp. _“Oh no, that poor boy. I get them too. Alright, you stay there, Joyce, and you make sure he’s taken care of. I’ll write it up.”_

“Thank you, Debbie,” Joyce whispers. 

_ “Goodbye, Ms. Byers. And good luck.”  _

Joyce puts the phone away, and finishes preparing the tea. She should go home soon, she thinks. She shouldn’t stay here when the owners of the house don’t even know she’s here.

But she feels bad leaving Billy alone, in the dark, even though the dark is a voluntary aspect of this. About the only voluntary aspect of any of this, from Billy’s side, at least, Joyce thinks. Besides, Debbie told her to stay with him. 

So she makes a second phone call, this one calling home and telling Jonathan that she probably won’t be able to get home that day, that he’ll have to take care of Will, and not to worry because she’s not in danger and it’s nothing to do with the Upside Down. She just doesn’t think the person she’s helping would want her to tell anyone else their business. Jonathan accepts this, because she raised her boys well, and they trust her. 

She takes the tea with her, and gently opens Billy’s door. 

Joyce had been hoping he’d have fallen asleep, but no such luck it seems. He’s groans when the light from the hallway streams in through the open door before Joyce closes it, and then it takes her a couple seconds to get used to the darkness well enough to see. And when she can see, the sight almost breaks her heart. 

Billy’s curled up into a tight ball, one hand wound into his hair so hard she thinks he’s going to pull it out, and the other seems to be wrapped around his stomach, although Joyce can’t be sure when the duvets are covering him. Kind of covering him, at least. They’re tangled around him. 

Joyce steps closer. “Billy?” 

“Hurts,” he whimpers. “Fuck. I wish I was dead.” He must see the look on Joyce’s face, because he amends: “Not really. Don’t worry. It’s always like this. It just...  _ hurts so fucking bad. _ ” 

Joyce puts the tea down on his bedside table and pulls his desk chair closer so she can sit down beside him. 

“You still nauseous?” She makes sure to keep her voice quiet.

“Y-Yeah. A little.” 

“I’ve got tea. It always helps me against nausea.” She gives him a little smile, meant to be encouraging. “You should drink something.” 

Billy doesn’t say anything, but he starts to pull himself up to sitting, and Joyce leans forward and helps him when she sees the way his arms shake. Once sitting, he leans his head back against the wall and takes a few seconds just to breathe. Joyce hands him the tea when he turns to look at her. 

He sips it quietly, and once he’s done he closes his eyes. Joyce reaches out and takes it from his almost slack hands. 

“Billy? Billy, hon, you have to eat something.” 

As Joyce watches, a couple of tears slip out and trail down his cheeks. He opens his eyes and looks at her, and there’s pain and desperation in his eyes. 

“I know. I want to. I’m so fucking hungry it physically  _ hurts _ _,_ but...” 

Joyce nods. “But you’re worried you’ll throw up.” 

“Yeah,” he breathes. 

“Well...” Joyce reaches over and grabs his rubbish bin. She holds it up so he can see it. “I’ve got a bin. And I’ll get you some toast. That usually works even if one’s feeling nauseous. Okay?”

“Okay.” 

Joyce smiles at him again, and leaves the room. It doesn’t take her long to pop some bread into the toaster, and soon she’s back in her chair by his bed, this time with a plate of food. 

Billy takes the plate when offered, and holds it up close to his mouth while eating, taking care not to spill crumbs on his bed. He eats surprisingly calmly, considering how hungry he must be. 

Halfway through the last piece, and he abruptly lets go of the bread. It falls down to the plate, and when it looks like he’s about to drop that as well, Joyce reaches over to take it from him and put it to the side. 

Both hands free, Billy’s back arches as he bends at the middle, arms moving up so his hands can tangle into his hair and grip his head. He lets out a chocked cry, and Joyce sees the shaking intensify. 

She reaches out and grabs his shoulders, trying to make him uncurl a little. “Alright, okay, lets get you lying down, just like that, yeah, good, good.” 

Billy lets out a sob as soon as his head hit the pillow. “It’s like I can feel my pulse inside my head. God, it’s pounding.” 

It’s unfair, putting someone through this much pain without an actual  cause . No injury to treat. Just time to wait until it’s over. Joyce has heard of migraines that last for  _ days _ . She doesn’t dare ask Billy how long his usually last. 

Joyce gets up to go find a towel in one of the cupboards in the hallway, and wets it in the bathroom before going back to Billy. She puts it on his forehead, and he lets out a shaky exhale, but doesn’t otherwise relax. His eyes are squeezed shut. 

And he’s tense all over. Joyce can’t image that helps in lessening the pain. And he’ll never fall asleep like this, either.

Joyce reaches out and buries her hand in his hair, starting to comb it through his curls and stopping to press against different spots on his scalp. 

Billy inhales sharply when he feels her hand, but he doesn’t open his eyes. Joyce sees the crease between his eyebrows slowly disappear, and figures that what she’s doing is probably helping. So she stays there, until Billy’s whole body has relaxed into sleep. 

Only then does she stand up, and go out into the kitchen. She grabs the phone and rings up Melvald’s. 

Donald answers, like she knew he would. 

“Hi Donald, it’s Joyce. I just wanted to let you know I might not be able to come in tomorrow. I’ve got a sick child to take care of,” she says, and doesn’t bother to mention it isn’t technically  _ her _ sick child. Not that Donald asks, he just accepts it with a sigh. Joyce has the evening shift tomorrow anyway, so who knows, she might call him tomorrow and let him know she’ll actually show up. Depending on if she feels Billy still needs someone to look after him. 

That done, she turns to get out ingredients. She’s going to make soup. 

_Thursday 21st of February 1985_

Billy sleeps until noon the next day, and Joyce spends the night on the Hargroves’ couch. Joyce is expecting him to either wake up still in pain, or to step into the kitchen yawning, maybe rubbing his palm against his eyes.

What she isn’t expecting is to hear a barely muffled curse word from his bedroom, followed by a crash that makes her get up from her chair in the kit while and walk up to his bedroom door just as it opens and Billy comes rushing out. He comes to a halt upon seeing her, so much like when he’d opened the front door yesterday, and frowns. 

“You’re still here?” 

Joyce shrugs. “Wanted to make sure you were okay before I left.” 

To look on Billy’s face tells her this is a very foreign concept to him. Joyce wonders if she should say something snide to Susan or Neil the next time she sees his parents. 

“Why?”

“Because I was worried about you.” 

His eyes still scream the same question.  _ Why?  _

Joyce sighs. “How’s the head?” she asks instead of answering, and hopes Billy will also drop the subject. 

He grimaces. “Better. It’s just a dull throbbing now. I can deal with it. I’m late for school.”

And Joyce realises why he’d come hurrying out of his room like he did. She mentally kicks herself for not informing him earlier. “I called the school. Told them you were sick. You’ve got the day off. You should rest.” 

Billy looks at her, shocked. “Oh.” 

Joyce wants to hug him. 

“Thank you,” he says. 

“Don’t worry, hon. There’s soup in the fridge.” 

“Yeah, I... Okay.” 

“I’ll see myself out, then?” She motions with her thin behind her, in the direction of the front door. Billy nods. Joyce gives him another small smile. 

“Bye Billy. Take care of yourself.” 

“I always do,” he says, his smile crooked. Joyce turns to go, but his voice stops her before she step fully out of the corridor. “And... Ms. Byers? Thank you, again.” A pause. “Thank you.”

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you liked it! If you did, please consider leaving kudos or writing a comment! They sustain me. 😂
> 
> I would like to say that this came from me having to self isolate at uni and thus having a... let’s say, “complicated” relationship to food, but the truth is I got this idea weeks ago when I read “He Walked In Through The Out Door” by HeckinaHandbasket (Go read that one as well, if you haven’t already. It’s amazing), and my current predicament? That shit just made this easier to write.


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